The number of films geared toward gay and/or lesbian audiences has skyrocketed in the past couple of decades, but many of them turn out to be sloppily made efforts that seem to take their audience for granted. It may have been the case 20 years ago that a movie could be considered noteworthy just for being out and proud, but that's not true anymore.

One director who has avoided this pitfall is Ira Sachs. His fourth feature, "Keep the Lights On," chronicles a homosexual relationship over nearly a decade with emotional forthrightness and physical explicitness. Making sure his film is accessible to straight audiences isn't Sachs' concern; telling an honest, unapologetic, semi-autobiographical story powered by a pair of very impressive performances is.

The movie opens in 1998, as Erik (Thure Lindhardt), a Danish documentary filmmaker living in New York City, arranges a hookup on a phone-sex line. That's how he meets Paul (Zachary Booth), a closeted lawyer with whom Erik begins a sometimes tumultuous relationship that plays out in fits and starts over the next hour and a half. The screenplay was reportedly assembled by Sachs out of old emails and diary entries, which might make the real-life analog of Paul nervous about the depiction of his crack addiction.

This isn't a blatantly political film, except to the degree that its realism is a political statement. In that way, it's like the recent British movie "Weekend." Though not quite as perfectly observed as that film, this is still a significant piece of work. "BIG EASY EXPRESS" Friday through Wednesday, Clinton Street Theater

The 2003 documentary "Festival Express" chronicled the 1970 trans-Canadian railroad tour by the Grateful Dead, Janis Joplin, the Band and other Woodstockian acts. Using long-lost footage, it captured the (literally and figuratively) hazy atmosphere of a time when popular rock stars seemed to genuinely enjoy jamming together for hours in the club car.

"Big Easy Express" attempts to do the same thing, only without the benefit of nostalgia and by traveling on a train from California to New Orleans. Scruffy alt-bluegrass and folk acts Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, Old Crow Medicine Show, and Mumford & Sons are the headliners. While it's hard to imagine they'll be as venerated as the "Festival Express" artists 30 years from now, their idealism seems genuine and their tunes are catchy. There's not much edge to either the film or the music, but ultimately both have a hazy appeal of their own.